CA-10: Democratic Internal Poll

We have another Democratic internal poll. For those keeping score at home, and you know you are, that's seven Democratic internal polls. This time the poll is in CA-10, the match0up between freshman Republican congressman Jeff Denham and Democratic challenger Jose Hernandez. Denham finished 16% ahead of the his two Democratic challengers in the primary 49%-33%. Based on that result, it shouldn't be close.

Let's start with a little background. This district was 42.1% Democratic/37.3% Republican registration in February, 2011. By May, 2012 it was 40.4% Democratic/38.6% Republican. The Democratic registration advantage went from 4.8% to 1.8%. That was the largest shift of any congressional district in the state. There were only four districts in the state that changed more than 1.4%. That's a really bad trend for the Democrats.

Based on estimates from absentee ballots, this was the likely primary vote breakdown. Note that the Democratic total includes Jose Hernandez and Mike Barkley, while the NPP vote is for Chad Condit and Troy McComak.

The pollster, PPP, has a party breakdown of 37% Democratic/31% Republican. That's a turn-out advantage that seems unlikely in the general election. It's far too Democratic. Even with this turn-out, the poll has Hernandez down 7%, 48%-41%. The rule of thumb is that an internal poll is skewed 6% toward the candidate doing the polling. If that's the case, Hernandez is down by 13%. That's a big margin, that's actually bigger than the 11 points that I've projected. You don't release a poll that has you down that much. It shows you're not in the race.